iNews Briefs

The official opening of the Health City Cayman Islands (known locally as The Shetty Hospital) took place this morning (Tue 25) and is billed as the launch of Cayman’s third economic pillar.

Former health minister, Mark Scotland, who steered the project in its early days said the moment that was an idea for medical tourism has now after two decades became a reality.

All those persons who were engaged in the project from its development until now are celebrating.

More on this later.

Only a few days left to respond to Cayman Government consultation

From Cayman Finance

George Town, Grand Cayman – For persons who want to let Government know their thoughts on beneficial ownership of companies – including if Cayman effectively maintains information on who owns the companies, and if that information is readily available to appropriate authorities – the deadline to respond is this Friday, 28 February.

Everyone is invited to respond to the consultation, regardless of whether or not they own a Cayman-registered business, said the Minister for Financial Services, Commerce and Environment, Wayne Panton.

‘We’ve had responses from persons locally and internationally, representing businesses, the financial services industry, individuals, and non-Governmental organisations’, he noted.

‘But in the interest of obtaining as many responses as possible, we again encourage persons to take a moment to give us feedback. This subject is important to all persons in Cayman’.

The consultation paper is available on http://bit.ly/KjGbQ7. Persons who have questions about the consultation are asked to email Wilbur Welcome, senior policy analyst in the Financial Services Secretariat, at [email protected].

New restrooms for GT

The Cayman Islands Government has commenced construction of a 288 sq.ft. public restrooms facility behind the George Town Public Library adjacent to the Bus Depot.

The facility that will cost $60,000 will provide separate male and female toilets with wheelchair access.

Tourism counsellor Joseph Hew, who was acting as tourism minister in the absence of the Deputy Premier, Moses Kirkconnell, visited the site last Thursday (20) and said, “Public rest rooms are a basic amenity that have been conspicuously absent from the George Town area for many years and I am pleased that is now being rectified. The new facilities are centrally located in a part of town that receives a great deal of pedestrian traffic and will therefore be a welcomed addition to the area. On busy cruise ship days in particular, passengers will be able to continue shopping and enjoying the sights, rather than having to return to the North or South Terminals when nature calls. ”

The building contract, following an open tender process, was awarded in December to Caystar Construction. The work is expected to be completed in June 2014.

WOW Expo 2014

The Family Resource Centre is hosting the first Wellness of Women (WOW) Expo in the Cayman Islands in commemoration of International Women’s Day (IWD), 8 March 2014. IWD celebrates the social, political and economic achievements of women while focusing attention on areas requiring further action. The area we are focusing on this year will be on women’s concept of self-care.

The WOW Expo will bring together service providers, practitioners. and facilitators of wetness programmes in the Cayman Islands. The aim of the expo is to INSPIRE CHANGE: from the inside out for girls and women of all ages. We hope attendees will get a chance to explore demo classes and presentations on all aspects of wellness, including but not limited to physical, emotional and spiritual.

Self-care refers to taking personal responsibility for one’s physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual health and it is a preventative means of ensuring wellness. The truth is women are often not on their own list of priorities. There are many women who aren’t living- they just exist. This is a form of self-abuse. Women often wear their exhaustion as a badge of honour. The challenge for women is that they must re-language what it means to be a woman, wife and mother. Being a good wife and mother means that if you do not take care of yourself, in the long run you are ultimately harming all the other people you love in your life. You will not be the only one who takes the hit. Through this self-care expo, we hope girls and women will get an opportunity to learn skills that will allow them to grow in all aspects of wellness. They will get a chance to try all types of exercise, have access to mental and physical health information sessions and become more self-aware of how much they value and that their wellness affects all.

The WOW expo will see vendors offering varied services, from tennis lessons to makeup touch ups.

For the fourth time the Cayman Islands Government has sent out for bids for someone to come and pay government to remove Cayman’s growing problem of old tyres. There were no bids forthcoming in the three previous attempts and this one received the same result – zero.

The problem is Government wants someone to actually pay them money for every tyre they remove.

Now the director of the Department of Environmental Health, Roydell Carter has said it is possible the government will now have to look at giving the tyres away instead of soliciting bids to sell them.

A developer has a already said he will take away the tyres free for use on a proposed golf course in the eastern districts.

Baron Funds Comments on Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd.

Shares of Qunar Cayman Islands Ltd. (QUNR) climbed 76.9% following its IPO on November1st.. Qunar is a Chinese travel booking service and the most visited travel website in China. Performance in the fourth quarter was driven by the company’s successful IPO with shares priced at $15 nearly doubling on the first day of trading. We continue to own Qunar because we think it has a highly scalable business model with high barriers to entry, attractive network effects, and a long runway for continued growth. (Catherine Chen)

WASHINGTON, USA — A Commission from the OAS Mechanism for Follow-Up on the Implementation of the Inter-American Convention against Corruption (MESICIC) will conduct on April 1 – 3, 2014, an on-site visit to Jamaica with the consent of the host country, as part of the follow-up “inter pares” process carried out by the Mechanism in various countries of the region.

The Commission will be made up of representatives from El Salvador and Grenada to the MESICIC who, with the support from the Department of Legal Cooperation of the Secretariat for Legal Affairs of the OAS, in its capacity as the Technical Secretariat of the MESICIC, will meet with representatives from oversight bodies responsible for preventing, detecting and punishing corruption to review the manner in which the Inter-American Convention is being implemented.

The purpose of the visit is to collect information in the field about how these organs perform their functions, which serve as inputs for the preparation of the report to be drawn up by the MESICIC on Jamaica in its September 2014 meeting.

It is anticipated that the Commission will meet with Jamaican civil society organizations in order to address topics related to the issues being analyzed in the Fourth Round of the MESICIC. Within the framework of the fourth round of evaluations, the OAS Anticorruption Mechanism is also expected to visit Belize, Haiti, Grenada, St Vincent and the Grenadines, and Suriname in April.

Pond smell will go away say developers if they are allowed to build marina

The Salt Water Pond on Cayman Bras that was there long before the owners of the Alexander Hotel decided to build right next door have been complaining for years about the stench from it.

The pond, however, is a declassified animal sanctuary, and the National Trust of the Cayman Islands says it has environmental significance as a natural habitat for the West Indian whistling duck.

The Department of Environment have concerns over the $2.5M marina project proposed there and is briefing Environment Minister Wayne Panton ahead of Cabinet’s decision on whether phase one of construction can go ahead.

The Trust has also expressed concern about the marine developer’s plan to cut through part of the reef that is within a marine park. They have warned the development could also damage nearby dive sites.

If the development is allowed, the smell will go and according to Timothy Dilbert, the hotel’s general manager, the marina would help attract new tourists to the island, particularly weekend boaters from Grand Cayman. He also said he hotel was unlikely to make much money from the project and was simply trying to do something for the Brac economy and deal with the pond problem at the same time.

West Bay to get Community Emergency Response Team

West Bay is getting its own Community Emergency Response Team.

Such teams are formed by members of a neighborhood or workplaces who are trained to be better prepared for hazards that threaten their communities.

Anyone who wants to join the new West Bay Community Emergency Response Team can attend a free training session to learn more about CPR, first aid and fire safety at the Sir John A. Cumber Primary School at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 27.

Team members are also trained to recognize, respond to and help their communities recover from major emergencies or disasters. The aim of these teams is to provide immediate, vital and often life-saving services during large-scale incidents, particularly when the response from professional emergency responders might be delayed.

Hazard Management Cayman Islands says these teams are not intended to replace a professional responder response capability, but rather, to supplement it.

The Cayman Islands Angling Club, the local governing body for the sport, hosts its first fishing tournament of 2014, the Barcadere Classic, March 1-2 at the Barcadere Marina in George Town.

Registration is Feb. 27 at the George Town Yacht Club from 6:30 p.m. Entry fee is $300 for a team of up to four anglers. The awards ceremony is March 4 at the Yacht Club from 7 p.m.

As usual, this year’s prizes center on Cayman’s three main types of game fish: yellowfin tuna, dolphin and wahoo. The heaviest tuna and dolphin each claim $2,000, the second heaviest fish in each class earns $1,000 and the third heaviest nabs $500 in both segments. The biggest wahoo lands $5,000, the second heaviest gets $3,000 and the third biggest takes home $1,000.